American Hustle

“American Hustle” is a film that lingers on your palate like that last sip of that flowery, chocolatey Beoujolais you had that one time. It’s sweet and it’s sophisticated It may make you feel a little tipsy, even a little sexy. But whatever it makes you feel, it lingers. Oh, how it lingers.

It lingers because when you’re done watching it you’ll wonder how a film so funny can also be so sexy and sad. And sexily sad. It lingers because  you’ll never be able to decide who in its stellar gave the best performance (I hesitantly choose Amy Adams, who is a Keane-eyed goddess in this).  It lingers because it never raises its voice. Its awesomeness never announces itself loudly, it quietly shows up and surprises you: that laugh you weren’t expecting, that jolt of electricity you feel when Amy Adams and Bradley Cooper share a scene. The way the amazing Christian Bale effortlessly almost* makes you forget he is an incredibly handsome Englishman and not a shlumpy balding New Yorker.

I won’t get into to plot. The plot doesn’t matter. “American Hustle” isn’t about plot. It’s about the hustle. It’s about how we hustle ourselves, how we hustle people we love, how we love people who hurt us and hurt people who love us. It’s about how we’re all hustling ourselves into a new career, a new romance, a new life. Or trying to.

It’s not many films that make me want break out language this florid and melodramatic. Please know you’ll probably  never read another movie review like this from me. (My next movie review will probably use words like “barf” and “unicorn” and it will be silly.)

Go see “American Hustle.” It’s lovely.

*I say almost because, bad wigs aside, the bones of Bale’s attractiveness are still there. They just are.